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I finish my thirty on the elliptical, my ankle only protesting slightly. I dismount carefully, grabbing my own towel and wiping off before heading over to my bag, excitement bubbling out of me. I stash my phone and my ear buds and then pull out the small gift bag and practically bounce over to Alex. It’s probably just my imagination or a trick of the overhead fluorescents making it look like his eyes light up when he sees me coming.
“I got you a present,” I say, holding the bag out towards him.
His eyebrows crawl up his forehead, and he shoves a hand through his sweat-damp hair. “You did?”
I nod, grinning like a complete idiot. “Yeah. It’s just something small. But I saw it and it made me think of you.”
His full lips pull up into a smile as he takes the bag, our fingers brushing and making my entire hand tingle.
My heart pounds in my chest as he opens it and then pulls out the twin green sticks.
“They’re lightsaber chopsticks,” I say in a rush, a little breathless.
He finds the buttons on the underside of each stick and turns them on, making them glow a vibrant green.
“A must have for any sushi-loving Star Wars fan,” I say, hoping he likes it.
He stares at the chopsticks for a moment before a huge smile breaks out across his face. “You got me a gift?”
My face feels like it’s on fire. This is me, trying to flirt and be cool. “Yeah. It’s just something small and silly that I saw on Amazon, and it made me think of you.”
“This is my favorite thing anyone’s ever gotten me,” he says, twirling one between his strong fingers.
“Yeah?” I ask, heart soaring in my chest, stomach full of butterflies.
“Definitely. You know what this means, though.”
I shake my head. “What?”
He points one of the chopsticks at me. “I need to treat you to sushi. Obviously.” He steps closer. “To try out the chopsticks, and to say thank you.”
“Like a date?” I ask, trying and failing to keep the tremble out of my voice. He opens his mouth, but before he can say anything, Deb and Scott step into the gym. Scott’s eyes zero in on us, standing close, and they narrow the tiniest bit.
I swallow and take a step back, my heart a jumbled mess, my stomach a pretzel.
I’ve had crushes before, but this, whatever this is with Alex, it feels like more than a crush. I might be inexperienced, but even I know enough to know that the chemistry between us, the magnetic pull…it’s more.
It’s crazy and it’s fast but…I have feelings for Alex. Pants feelings, and brain feelings, and heart feelings. The trifecta. He’s hot and he’s sweet and I like being with him and we have the shared passion of our sport as this common language…And when he looks at me with those gorgeous brown eyes and tells me I’m a good girl, I think I might combust.
We grab some water and then start working through some lifts with Deb and Scott’s help, adjusting my positioning, fine tuning Alex’s grip, working through different types of dismounts. With the points system in figure skating, every small part of what we do is scrutinized and we need to add difficulty—and points—wherever we can. A more difficult dismount means more points, and when the difference between first and fifth is as little as two points out of nearly two hundred, every little bit counts.
We take a break for lunch, where I can’t help but notice that Scott takes up all of Alex’s attention while I eat and chat with Deb and a few other skaters who are training on the ice today.
After lunch, we move to a different room, one set up just like a dance studio, in order to work with a dance instructor in preparation for our long program. It’s a tango-inspired number to music from Moulin Rouge, so the plan is to actually learn the tango to make the program as authentic as possible.
And so that’s what we spend the afternoon doing. We work on the basic holds, the steps, the dips and turns. I struggle more than Alex does, mostly because it’s freaking hard to concentrate with his hands on me, his body flush against mine, his eyes boring into me as we move in time to the music.
“I think this is excellent progress,” says the dance instructor, a friendly woman in her forties named Nicole. “I think now you should work on it on your own, experiment and play, and get comfortable with the style of movement. That balance of rigidity and passion twined together.” She twists her fingers together in a visual demonstration.
Then she leaves the two of us alone together in the dance studio, sweaty, breathing hard.
I move to the corner to take a sip of my water, and Alex retreats to the stereo.
“Run it again?” he asks, and when I turn, his eyes are locked on me, his face a mask of intensity.
“Yeah, sure.” I nod, hands on my hips.
“Unless you need a break? How’s your ankle?” He takes a few steps in my direction, and I feel all melty inside.
